Minister Predicts German Foreign Aid Boost

German Development Minister Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul expects the cabinet to approve a significant increase in German developmental aid over the next few months, she said in New York this week. The Social Democrat said such a decision would "in any case" be made before the next United Nations summit, in September. Like all other countries, Germany in 2000 committed itself at the UN millennium summit to increasing developmental aid to 0.7 percent of GDP by the year 2015, she added. "The EU will make their decision in the course of May and we should follow soon after," Wieczorek-Zeul said after a meeting with UN Secretary General Kofi Annan.